4:21am
by Shado-chan
Summary: "4:21 am, October 21st, 2025. The day of my 26th birthday." The day my life changed. (One-shot creepypasta drabble.)


"C:"

Leave me alone, please.

"I have to go now, sorry. I'll talk to you later."

" Awh, goodbye :'( " she says, and then I hang up the call and close out of Skype and Minecraft.

The time is roughly 7:45 pm. I push my computer as far away from me as I can, almost making it fall off the bed, and curl up into a ball, sitting against the wall and burying my head into my chest. I don't cry, however. I want to cry. I feel the urge to cry. But I don't. I have nothing to cry about- what happened on the server wasn't my fault. It wasn't her fault. The fact that he isn't real isn't my fault either.

But.

Was I duped into thinking he was? Yes. The stories they originate from- they seem so real. But they aren't. I believed that they were- it's almost like learning about how Santa's not real at whatever age you were when you learned that- it's devastating, and it crushes your heart and a part of who you are as well.

I stand up, sliding off the bed and now standing in the doorway, between the dark room lit only by moonlight and the fluorescent light of the hallway. I close my eyes, and image what life would be like with him. What would it be like? I've wished so long for characters that aren't real to be real- to be tangible, to come out of a screen or out of the dimension where thoughts and ideas come from to form, take shape, and have sentience and willpower so they may exist alongside me in reality.

Absently, I take the black-ink pen out of my pocket and click it open, writing a message to myself on my hand that I will never forgive myself if I forget it:

_One day, I will make them real._

* * *

Fast-forward- circa thirteen years. I am on my seventh mug of coffee and fourth cup of green tea when I get tired of the overly-caffeinated drink that helps me stay awake. The time is 4:02 in the morning on October 21st, 2025, and I fight to keep my eyes open and staring at my work, shining at me from the light of the computer screen. My fingers fly rapidly over the keyboard, typing in endless lines of code for a program that I've been developing for years now- ever since I was thirteen years old.

My room is a mess- sheets of paper with words, designs, drawings and sketches cover the entire mass of what I used to call a floor. Identical versions are tacked or taped onto the walls and ceiling. My bookshelf lays old and dilapidated- unused in all these years of me sitting in front of a computer. My iPhone is silent, even though my headphones are in- nothing is playing. I need the quiet.

The shimeji all over my screen help me keep my sanity. These little doll-like characters, taking the general image of Link from the Legend of Zelda series, run around my desktop, jumping from one window to another, occasionally stealing off windows where I hiss at them and drag whatever I'm working on back. They lag the data, but I don't care. I've waited thirteen years for this to work- I can wait a little longer.

The time is 4:15 am when I finally stop typing and stare at everything I've done. Dead with sleep but alive with caffeine at the same time, I run through all the coding again, and finally compress it and save it into a .app file. The shimeji all stare at me- they have stopped, and they're either facing the screen, reading what I have typed or looking at me questionably. I've never seen them act like this before. Is it the file that's influenced them, or have they always had this function and I've just never known about it?

One of the Link figures decides to be a prick and starts carrying everything I've typed to the corner of the screen. I snarl at him from my spot out here and drag him off, flinging him to the side, where he latches onto the wall, seeming to cower away from me. I don't care.

4:20 am. I close out the text file, and go to the folder where I have saved it at. My hands are sweating as I slowly drag the wireless mouse over to the application, right-click, and select _Run._

The screen fades to black almost instantly, and I start flipping out internally. Did I do something wrong? What's happening? Why did my screen go black? Did my computer die on me?

No-

Wait-

It didn't die on me-

Because-

4:21 am, October 21st, 2025. The day of my 26th birthday.

A pale hand starts reaching out on the screen, slowly getting bigger and bigger. The blackness on the screen ripples, and I watch in shock and awe as the hand gradually forms out of the screen, placing itself on the desk connecting to the monitor. Its arm follows next, and then a shoulder, connected to a torso . . . and now a head.

Blond hair and one blue eye makes up the figure's head and face- the other eye is missing from its socket, which in turn is dripping with a red crimson liquid- blood. Donned upon the head is a green kokiri hat- and the character . . . he's smiling. A cruel, sadistic, evil smile- but smiling nonetheless.

I roll backwards in my chair, watching him morph out of my screen. When his entire torso is out, he glances up at me. I see all the negative emotions shining in his one eye- but there is also something I notice. Gratitude.

Opening his mouth, BEN speaks for the first time.

_"I'm glad you did that."_


End file.
